I attended the first, government-sponsored Weight of the Nation conference in 2009. I didn't pay or anything self-defeating like that. I just walked in (with a brave friend or two) and delivered plastic-wrapped fortune cookies to the fancy luncheon tables where major stakeholders were about to chew on the alleged "obesity" problem. If the professional food scolds took a cookie, they got messages like these:

The war on "obesity" is a war on PEOPLE!

The No. 1 threat to fat people? Your unexamined prejudice.

What's the word for science that serves bigotry? Hint: It starts with "you."

If you can't imagine fat people being healthy...that's YOUR pathology!

Tell people to lose weight if you want to endanger public health AND civil rights!

How many fat people must you starve, poison, slice up? Celebrate weight diversity now!

AND she includes this nice video from the Association for Size Diversity and Health (ASDAH):

It sounds as though TWOTN is getting a ridiculously disproportionate amount of media coverage for a cable tv show. Perhaps it's the down to the involvement of important sections of the Obama government (and Goddess help us all if BO decides to make our eradication an election issue), or the way it's been framed as some sort of generation-defining, moon-landingesque mass TV moment (which makes me wish all the more that it had been put together in a more sensitive and less alarmist fashion, fat chance of that I know).

However the number of carefully thought out, well-researched and excellently written FA responses to this have made me feel more encouraged than I've probably felt in weeks. And Marilyn's patience is incredible; I've long since passed the stage where I have the sanity points to deal with discussion threads of that sort of intensity on fat panic articles. Things were so much easier before every single news item came complete with this requisite opportunity for the oh-so-well informed lumpencommentariat to educate us all about how fat and stupid we all are.

"What is right is not always popular and what is popular is not always right" - Albert Einstein

I read about 1/3 of the comments before I had to head off to physical therapy, and I hit the "like" button for everything Marilyn said, and for everyone who was saying things to back her up and support her. I'll go back later on and pick up where I left off. How I wish there was a "dislike" or "wrong" button to click for those who are fat-phobic bigots though, that would be the icing on the cake (lol).

Yes, there were some complainers, but I found the comments mostly positive to that article.
Now would someone tell me - if, as a fat person, I have difficulty finding clothes, getting quality medical care, a good job, getting people to listen to me, political representation, etc., etc., - how I got the power to crush a whole nation into oblivion? WOW! How might I exercise this awesome power, if I ever choose to use it? Not that I particularly want to just yet. But I sure want to know how. Also, if merely being obese has this fantastic power, why don't we export obesity to troublesome nations, instead of sending troops?

Thank you so much, BFB and people here, for the kind words and support! I'm pleased to see the many comments (even the hate-filled ones) because it means the post is getting readers. I think it's useful, even when someone is wholly unwilling to change their thinking, that they have the experience of seeing their worldview questioned. They have to know it's not unanimous or unassailable after that. And of course, any good the post does, is awesome!